Any sports psychologists around?

[BrassicaBabe]

Any sports psychologists around? I want to learn to be mentally tougher when I'm running. How do I do that? My body is a heap load more capable than my mind. My mind breaks before my body too often. I want to learn to dig in, to learn to get comfortable with being uncomfortable, to push on instead of giving up etc.

Interested if a few appointments with a psychologist might help. And would they be familiar with neuro-diversity.

have you considered running with a friend?

what kind of distances do you run?

Thanks. I've run 1 marathon. Currently working up to HM distance after losing miles in 2023.

The problem is my mental "breaks" happen if I'm on my own or running with a friend 🤷‍♀️

I’m not a sports psychologist but I do run, and find that mindfulness techniques work quite well.
Your brain is trying to protect you and make your life easy all the time, so the intrusive thoughts on a run are your brains way of trying to protect you. It helps to realise that those thoughts are not reality. I sometimes talk back to the thoughts “Thanks brain, I know you’re trying to protect me,but this run is ok”

It also helps me to do a body scan - my brain normally starts panicking about how I will feel when I get to X point on my run, so I try to bring my focus back to my current state: how is my form? How is my breathing right now? How are my legs right now?

It’s maybe worth digging into your “mental breaks”. What are the thoughts that trigger them, and how can you think about them differently?

I find distraction helps a lot - my best runs are when I’m listening to a gripping podcast/audiobook as I’ve focused on that rather than listening to my inner voice which is invariably telling me to stop!

Having a specific goal helps eg I'm going to run a half marathon in sub 1hr 45 and visualising how happy you will be when you cross the line in 1hr 44. Think about this when you feel you're about to give up. Think about the positive emotions and how proud you will be of yourself.
Distraction also works but find out what kind is best for you. For most people, music really helps but as you say you are ND explore other methods too. I took part in a really interesting experiment for someone's PhD once where you had to withstand pain as long as possible. Music didn't help me at all, but doing tricky mental arithmetic worked wonders and I totally forgot about the pain. Maybe you're similar and doing mental sums about pace etc would distract you.

did you ask if she’s happy with you broadcasting her like this?